#obviously this is heavily in process

[late-to-the-magnus-archives]

snippet!

hey you can't deal with issues unless you face them, right?

(everyone needs therapy)

----------

The King dwarfs the apple trees.

It’s quiet in the little stable behind them. Again, the animals don’t seem to care. “What did you do to the animals?” Jon says, because he can’t not wonder.

“Ensured they do not detect me unless I wish,” says the King, who hasn’t bothered to land; he hovers above the fish-pond, sending little waves across its surface. “Otherwise, they tend to be… skittish.”

“I can believe that,” Jon murmurs, wondering if it’s the same kind of influence the Hunt extends to animals. He wonders next at the rippling pond next. Is it aesthetic or practical? Is there an air-current effect, or some kind of gravitational adjustment? Can he do that without disturbing the water? Would it be palpable to anyone or anything beneath him? Is it harmful? Is it even real, or a dream-effect? How does -

“You really never stop,” says the King, pulling Jon out of comforting curiosity.

“What do - ” Careful, Sims. Jon modifies his tone. “What do you want from me tonight, sir?”

The King laughs. 

Jon reddens. As attempts to placate monsters go, it wasn’t very good. Anything to keep his attention away from that room and Martin.

“You already know,” says the King so graciously that Jon grits his teeth. “Call the Entities.”

Jon exhales. “I can’t.”

There is a low, displeased rumble, almost mechanical, not a growl, but something worse. “You won’t. I don’t appreciate lies, Archivist.”

“It’s just Jon,” mutters Jon, shaking because he hadn’t been trying to lie, really needs to not make this thing angry while Martin is near.

“As you wish… Jon.”

So that was a mistake.

Jon has no idea if it has something to do with the old concepts of “true names” or whatever, but the King saying that is far, far worse than Archivist. It pings something in him, trembles some soul-deep string in sympathetic resonance.

“Call the Entities.”

“I won’t. Sir. I didn't even choose to do it the first time.” And it hits him: “You could probably force me. Why haven’t you?”

“Before your ascension? Yes. I could have forced you, tricked you, trained you.”

Jon swallows bile.

“But now? It is… delicate. You’ve damaged yourself, Jon - damaged your soul when you rejected all you were given, though perhaps you can’t be blamed. It was too much for any human to bear.” That statement manages to be pitying and denigrating at the same time. “Regardless, I can’t force you now without destroying your ability to do it at all. You’ll have to do it by choice.”

So that’s confirmed.

Jon stares. “Damaged? How?”

“This isn’t the place to show you,” says the King. “Once you obey, I’ll show you. I’ll even heal you, if you want.”

Like hell he’d ever invite this thing to touch his soul. “I won’t call them by choice. You need to listen to me. They’ll destroy the world you’ve built.”

“A world you don’t seem to appreciate, anyway - in spite of my graciousness toward you,” says the King.

All of this is so damned threatening, all of this is a looming Damocles’ sword. “I know them. I know what they can do. I won’t… inflict them on an innocent universe.”

“Now, Jon,” says the King, and that rumble is pleased now, because Jon gave him an opening and didn’t think it through. “That’s not true, is it? You already did. You made that choice - it just didn’t turn out quite the way you thought.”

This is true. 

And all the weight of that choice - the force of it, the shame - lands on him again as though facing him for the first time.

The choice to send the Entities elsewhere, because of Martin’s plea.

The choice to send the Entities elsewhere, violating his conscience, pretending at hope.

The choice to send the Entities elsewhere, because Martin was going to die, and Jon couldn’t do that, in the end.

Could not.

But he had chosen to send the Entities elsewhere. The reason, maybe, didn’t matter.

Jon is silent.

He hasn’t thought about that moment since they arrived. He’s refused. They haven’t talked about it. Haven’t dealt with it.

Jon doesn’t think he can deal with it.

He looks at his feet, at the boots that actually fit him (one of their first purchases, and one Martin was very proud of), and cannot bring himself to speak.

“All I want you to do is finish what you already started,” the King practically purrs at him. “Call the Entities. It’s a choice you already made, Jon. Don’t worry. I will keep you safe.”

Jon shakes his head, just a little, but doesn’t raise his head. “You can’t. No one can.”

That rumble again, displeased, there and gone. “You are running out of chances to do this the easy way.”

Jon shudders hard. “I know. I’m sorry.” He’s not even sure what he’s apologizing for.

There is a moment of bad silence. The only thing in it is Jon’s fear because he doesn’t know how long he can hold out once the King decides the easy way is done.

“Enjoy your stay,” says the King. “I suggest the stew - it’s particularly hearty.” And he’s just gone.

Jon covers his face with his hands and doesn’t go back to his bed or his body until he can slow his non-corporeal breathing down.

[redjukebox]

Me @ my brain: cmon man we gootta focus on this school shit and we gotta do all these things to ensure we’re good for the next quarter and we literally cannot be late or we’re so screwed and we reeeaally have to make an appointment like we’ve had to for the past 3 months pleeeaasee

My brain: ok but like what if Tick Tock constantly feels the need to move around, whether it’s moving his ears, tail, tapping his hoof, or even just talking to make sure that he still can?? Like bro was paralyzed and literally could not move AT ALL for at LEAST a year (at the very VERY least) like that must’ve done SOOOO MUCH DAMAGE OH MY GOD HE LITERALLY COULD NOOOT MOOVE BRO HE WAS 12

[carbonateddelusion]

thinks about 80s jack...

[jvzebel-x]

(a love story in five parts:)

"You could do anything to me, and I'd let you. ... Tell me you love me, at least. Please. I need to know somebody does."

"I always think of a passage from the Symposium, this allegory about people who started off as two halves of a whole, but then something cut them apart and they spend their whole lives looking for the other half so they can fit themselves back together. And that's how it feels. It hurts. It's like I lost you before I was born."

"I know why you fuck me like you wish you could kill me. I know everything that gets you off, you can't help but show me. There's no part of you that I can't see."

"Because it wasn't as if they'd never hurt each other before-- between them, it was a kind of tenderness, writing themselves onto each other's bodies with every mark they left. It was a promise: I'm here, I've always been here. Pain was a necessary consequence, but that was all it was."

"All they were-- all they had ever been-- was a pair of sunflowers who each believed the other was the sun."

x. "These Violent Delights", Micah Nemerever

[vampirebutterflies]

why must the sexiest bitches suffer the worst aggies

[the-cat-at-the-theatre-door]

Thinking about Deuteronomy again, being that first point of contact for most cats in being welcomed into their family, newborns and new additions alike, but I'm thinking specifically about cats who were perhaps born into their group, left, and *then* came back, and how those are usually situations where Deuteronomy can sort of...tell if they'll be back when they do leave. He can't say anything about it, but he knows. Cats who know him very well can almost catch the expression that indicates one way or the other when he's informed of their leaving if he believes they'll be back. And - outside of the occasional anomaly - he's usually right about it.

He remembers, distantly, holding a little grey queenkit in his arms during one of his visits years and years ago, fresh faced and lovely, thinking: "This one will do big things" - not great things, not even potentially successful things, but big things nonetheless. He remembers a whisper of her little voice filled with confidence fading suddenly into silence; remembers thinking he hoped she would eventually find whatever it was she couldn't here, that she would find her way back when it was time, carefully avoiding the even stare of her mother as he passed her back.

And when he holds that little grey queen in his arms decades later, just when he thought he'd been wrong, only a little bigger, the sharp curves of her bones jutting from her fur, face so much older now, he sees that little one again, and smiles. Murmurs: "Welcome home", before he passes her onto the stars, hoping she finds her way back again to make up for lost time.

[maybebabyplease]

editing tips pt. 2

people seemed to like this last time, so here are some more of my personal favorite editing tips! previous post here if you missed it and are interested.

typical disclaimer applies. write whatever the fuck you want! don’t edit it! who cares! not me! editing is just one of my hobbies/interests/essential to my career, so i really enjoy talking about it. hit me up if you’d like to chat more about editing or if you have any of your own tips to share! life is all about learning, and i am always trying to do so :)

1. check for ‘your’ words and phrases. everyone has words and phrases they overuse. there’s a guardian article that points out some of the words/phrases famous authors use, proving that even your fav could probably get a lot of mileage out of a command + F! Make a list of the words you know you use to death and then search your doc for them. do they really need to go there? or could you pick something else? keep the best and cut the rest. for me, my most overused words are ‘quite’ and ‘smirk’. and no one is smirking quite that much! there are also some words that just generally get overused – they may not be specific to you. one word that stands out to me in particular is the word ‘that” (ha, i even just used it). it’s not a bad word at all, and sometimes it’s the only option. but a lot of times, it’s extraneous and you can cut it entirely. example: ‘Em decided that she wanted to go to the movies’ could just be ‘Em decided she wanted to go to the movies’. you don’t notice the missing ‘that’ – the sentence still works. 2. the power of white space. i think i saw something about this recently, so it’s definitely being discussed around here! but this is one of my favorite parts of editing: arranging everything on the page. i actually hadn’t thought very much about this until i got ‘more white space’ as advice from my writing group on one of my stories a while back. paying attention to the use of space on the page can totally change the way your piece reads. for example, separating out a particular line of dialogue to make its own paragraph gives it so much much more weight. but this works in the reverse, too: if you separate out every line or every other line, you’re going to lose that emphasis. for maximum effect, you should vary paragraphs like you vary sentences: change up the lengths, change up the cadence. there are ‘rules’ you can look up about when to switch paragraphs (every time the topic changes, i think) but you can usually just sort of vibe it out. make it attractive to the eye and fun to read (so, the opposite of this post, where i have included 0 white space lol) 3. recycle your babies. look, i get it. sometimes you write a fucking banger sentence. it is so good. you’re so proud of it. you nailed that metaphor or description or whatever. but then you do it again, and again, and again. and now the readers are slogging through cold molasses prose trying to figure out what’s going on in the story. humans care deeply about storytelling, and you’ll lose your readers’ attention if they feel like they’re missing out on story for you to play with language. the thing is, though, it’s great to play with language! it’s the best thing! it’s the fun part of writing! so when you’re overdoing it, cut those sentences out and put them in a separate doc to save for later. we’re not killing our babies anymore! we’re just, you know, being environmentally conscious. reduce/reuse/recycle. 4. just say ‘said’. a lot of people already know this one, but i also feel like a lot of people were told not to overuse the word 'said'? and like, do whatever you want. but if you’re using a synonym for said every single time, they aren’t going to pop. 'said' is one of those words that the eye/brain doesn’t notice when you’re reading. it basically doesn’t count! all the synonyms are super noticeable, though, and if you overuse them, readers will be pulled out of the piece. plus, the less you use them, the more work they can do for you when you do decide to pepper them in. that way, when your character ‘announces’  or 'explains' or 'divulges' something, it will stand out to the readers and they’ll pay more attention to that particular bit.  5. chop your first/last paragraph(s). this one takes a little knowledge of who you are as a writer (person?). you may do your best writing in the first/last paragraph! personally, i tend to struggle more with writing my way into stories than writing my way out of them. i can usually guarantee that i’ll need to cut at least the first paragraph of anything i’m writing, if not the whole thing. and then if i do end up having trouble with an ending, i’ll purposefully write ‘past’ it and then cut all the extra. but don’t be afraid to cut! you can always recycle things (see above) or, you know, save it for the sequel… 6. raise the stakes. this one sort of depends on the type of story you’re writing. some fic (and original work) is more vibe-centric, and your readers might not necessarily care that much about the plot/story. when i re-read over my work, if it feels boring, it’s usually because not enough is at stake. the characters don’t want enough and the consequences aren’t big enough. if you just go through and make everything a little bit harder, a little bit worse for them, you might find yourself with a more interesting story. you can introduce a whole new challenge, an unforeseen obstacle, an unsolvable mystery, a hurricane of emotional turmoil...the possibilities are endless! 7. put the piece aside, read your favorite book, and then come back. if you’re struggling for inspo, look at what the writers you like are doing. writing is thievery, after all (not plagiarism. thievery. take that set of fancy silver utensils and melt it down and turn it into a bowl, don’t just slap your name on all the forks). come back to your own work refreshed, inspired, and ready to make changes. 8. add a character/drop a character. so something fundamentally isn’t working in your story! you want to fix it up! you can’t figure out what’s wrong! one thing you can do is take a look at your cast of characters. each character brings something to the story, unless they don’t. is there anyone who drags down the scene every time they’re in it? or would the inclusion of another character change the motivations or actions of the characters you already have? it’s something to consider if you think your story falls flat.

ok that’s plenty for today, i think. would love to hear thoughts if anyone has them!

[boyswillbedogz]

insatiably craving meat once again. might be able to trick my brain with something else savory since we dont really have any on hand- might ask mother to get lunch meat next time she goes shopping so we can sate the craving cuz we get it a lot and it would be great if we coukd just inhale packages of lunchmeat whenever we want.

[box-dwelling]

For a person who bonded onto Miles Edgeworth like a baby duck, when I write I really do focus on Phoenix and his struggles way more than Edgeworths.

[azrielsrealmate]

never just a best friend

azriel x reader

summary: your best friends offers a massage after a stressing day, only that his hands end up slipping to dangerous places.

warnings: smut

word count: 2k

Your feet ached, your head throbbed, and your skin itched in places you couldn’t reach to scratch. And your back—God, your back hurt.

You just needed a break. A break longer than the eight hours of sleep you rarely had time to get.

Azriel’s gaze from where he sat at the edge of your bed made the back of your neck burn. So you hurried to pull your shirt over your head, and the feeling disappeared, knowing he’d look anywhere but at you while you changed. You almost sighed in relief, almost rubbed the space between your brows. But instead, you unclasped your bra and slipped into a shirt several sizes larger than what you usually wore.

You hadn’t deliberately chosen Azriel’s shirt to breathe in the comforting scent of cedar and mist instead of the tobacco and beer your idiot ex had left lingering everywhere. You really hadn’t. But it was a relief you hadn’t known you needed.

“What happened?”

A simple question, but spoken in that voice, deep yet so soft, like silk brushing against clean skin, it almost made you sob.

What happened wasn’t the question; the question was why you felt so easily overwhelmed. You turned to look at him, and the caramel color of his eyes softened as he read how overstimulated you felt. He stood up, and even from the distance between you, you could clearly see how tall he was.

He crossed the space in mere seconds, and his scarred palm found your cheek, cradling it tenderly. Your eyes closed involuntarily. The warmth of his hand melted your mind, sending the hot liquid of it out of your body in the form of a sigh.

“What happened?” he repeated again.

You sighed.

“Adrik.” You said the name of your ex, not needing to open your eyes to know that Azriel’s features had hardened.

You spent so much time watching him that you’d almost memorized his micro-expressions.

“I ran into him at the café next door, and…” your best friend’s thumb stroked your cheek, encouraging you to continue. “Well, obviously, it didn’t end well.”

“What did he do?” Azriel asked, his voice rough. So different from how he’d asked what happened earlier. You could hear the sharp undertone clearly.

You’d been through this before.

You shook your head and moved his hand away from your cheek, your thumb tracing a small caress on his skin before letting go. You took off your pants, because you slept with little clothes, and you sighed heavily, walking toward your side of the bed.

“He just stuck to me like the worm he is.” You didn’t even want to imagine what would happen to the poor drunk Adrik if you let go of the weakening reins on Azriel. The muscles under your skin tingled pleasantly just thinking about it. Adrik had treated you so poorly, and it would be so easy to let Azriel handle him…

But, no. No. You weren’t doing this.

You sat on the bed, feeling your body tense slightly under his gaze. He studied you as if he wanted to squeeze out that feeling he knew existed in you, the one you worked so hard to push down, to extract and stretch it so he could examine it.

“What do you mean by…” his brows furrowed, finally processing your words.

You didn’t let him finish.

“Damn it, Azriel, he left after two minutes. Please, just lie down, I’ve had the worst day ever,” you pleaded, feeling a cramp run down your back. “And to top it all off, my back hurts,” you complained.

You heard Azriel exhale. It took him a fraction of a second to speak.

“I can see the tension in your muscles from here,” he said.

You rolled your shoulders, as if that would bring relief.

“It’s not that bad.”

He didn’t pay you the slightest attention.

“Where did you leave the oil from last time?” The last time he’d worked a wonderful massage on your back, you could swear it could have made you finish faster than Adrik ever had.

The silence in the room grew thicker as Azriel waited for your response. You knew he wouldn’t move until you told him. Not because he was pressuring you, but because he wanted to take care of you. As he always did.

“It’s in the nightstand, top drawer,” you replied, trying to sound casual, even though you knew exactly what it meant once he put his hands on you.

Azriel walked over to the nightstand, pulled out the small bottle of oil, and held it in his hand for a moment, assessing your state. His eyes met yours, and something in his gaze made your breath quicken slightly. It wasn’t the first time he’d offered you a massage, but this time, there was a tension between you that you couldn’t ignore, not when it made anticipation itch in your skin.

“Take off your shirt,” he instructed, his voice soft but firm. Your heart skipped a beat, and you hesitated for a moment, but seeing the calm in his eyes, you made up your mind. Slowly, you removed your shirt, revealing your body covered only by a tiny black thong.

Azriel swallowed, his eyes darkening slightly as they roamed over your figure. You felt a warmth spread across your skin under his intense gaze, but you remained still, waiting for his next move.

He approached, leaned in, and his large, warm hands grabbed your hips, quickly dragging you until you were sitting where he could rest his hands on your shoulders first, beginning with a light pressure. His touch was firm but gentle, and he began working on your tense muscles, gliding down your back with expertise. The oil, warm against your skin, made it easier for his hands to move as he focused on relaxing you.

A sigh escaped your lips as you felt a knot dissolve under his fingers. He leaned in closer, his breath brushing against your ear.

“Let go of all that tension,” he murmured, his voice rough with concentration as his hands traveled down your back to the curve of your waist, his thumbs pressing gently at the base of your spine.

A low moan escaped you, and you closed your eyes, allowing the pleasure of the massage to envelop you completely. Azriel continued, his hands moving confidently, exploring every inch of your lower back, dangerously close to the edge of your thong. His touch was addictive, and though you tried to stay calm, you felt your body reacting to every caress, every calculated pressure.

“You have no idea how beautiful you look,” Azriel whispered, his voice vibrating against your skin as his hands paused for a moment, just above the line of your thong. The heat in his voice made you shiver.

Opening your eyes, you turned your head slightly to look at him, finding his face close to yours, his eyes locked on yours. The tension in the room became almost palpable, and in that instant, you knew you had crossed a line.

Azriel lowered his hands, sliding them down your hips to the edge of your thong, slowly—too slowly.

He stopped in the curve of your hips, squeezed the flesh, in his hands, feeling and appreciating them. And slowly, he guided one hand toward your abdomen, the other toward your ribs.

You whimpered slightly, needily, your breath heavy.

“Be patient,” he murmured against your ear, your eyes fluttering closed. You felt the warmth of his hand move up to cup one of your breasts, relishing its size. Your brows arched. “Az…” you sighed.

His other hand slid down to slip under the fabric of your black thong, finding there a wetness that made him hum in satisfaction.

“So wet, all this for me?” You moaned again, struggling to keep your eyes open.

His scarred fingers explored your wetness, tracing a line from your entrance to your clitoris, spreading all your arousal. He drew a circle on your clit, torturously slow, tentative, you might have said if your brain weren’t mush.

Your back arched again. “Azriel,” you moaned his name, and he, in turn, growled in your ear.

“Do you like that?” he asked, and you realized he wanted an answer when he stopped his fingers.

“Yes, yes!” you pleaded, almost desperately.

Azriel let out a low sound, almost a growl, upon hearing your response, satisfied with the power he had over you in that moment. His hand remained still, his fingers barely brushing your clit, enough to keep you on edge, but not enough to give you the relief you so desperately craved. The tension in the room was palpable, each passing second seemed to stretch time, amplifying the desire that wrapped around you.

“If you enjoy it so much,” he murmured against your neck, his hot breath sending a shiver down your spine, “then you’re going to wait a little longer.”

The sweet agony of anticipation spread through your body as Azriel maintained that light, frustrating touch that made every fiber of your being burn with desire. You tried to move, seeking more of him, more of that contact that promised so much, but his hands became firm, holding you in place.

“Don’t move,” he ordered gently, and there was an authority in his voice that made you obey without hesitation. There was something about the way Azriel controlled you, how he handled your body with such precision, that made you feel vulnerable and at the same time completely safe. You felt the heat of his body against your back, his hardness pressed against you as his scarred fingers moved again, this time applying more pressure on your clit. The pleasure that blossomed from that simple touch was overwhelming, and you couldn't help but moan, arching your back to get closer to him.

"Good girl," Azriel whispered, his tone laden with satisfaction as he increased the rhythm of his caresses. You felt his other hand slide up your abdomen, moving up to caress your breasts, squeezing them with a possessiveness that made your breath catch in your throat. His lips pressed against your neck, sending waves of pleasure through your body as his fingers continued to play with your wetness.

“I want you to come for me,” he growled against your ear, his voice a comman. And with that, his movements became more intense, more urgent. The sweet torture he’d imposed on you faded into a wave of pleasure so overwhelming that it left you trembling, your moans turning into cries of pleasure as you approached the edge. His fingertips skilfully working on your clit.

Azriel’s fingers worked with expert precision, pushing you closer and closer to the precipice of an orgasm, until you finally exploded in a wave of pure pleasure, your body trembling as you were suddenly blind and deaf from pleasure. You let out a long, satisfied moan as Azriel’s name escaped your lips in a sigh, your whole being consumed by the heat of that moment.

And even as the pleasure began to fade, Azriel didn’t stop. His hands continued to explore your body, his lips still pressed against your neck, leaving wet kisses that sent delicious shivers through your spine. The sensation of his touch, so skilled and confident, combined with the residual pleasure of your orgasm, left you breathless, utterly spent in his arms.

When you finally came down from that blissful high, you turned to look at him, finding a possessive gleam in his eyes, as if he couldn't get enough of you.

Well, you had never considered him just your best friend.

"I hope your back doesn’t hurt anymore.”

[starsandwriting]

Haha. Hahaha.

[ID: Alternating excerpts from the transcripts of The Magnus Protocol episode 11 and The Magnus Archives episode 112 and 67.

1.

Gwen: I thought he was going to kill me!

Lena: But he didn’t, which means you’ve passed the first part of your probation. Congratulations. Did you scream?

2.

(Elias): congratulations. You’re doing a lot better than I expected.

Archivist: Feels like all I’ve managed to do is… not die.

Elias: And believe me, that is a remarkably rare skill.

3.

Gwen: I don’t understand.

Lena: Yes, you do.

Beat.

Gwen: But… why?

Lena: “Why” comes later. For now, it’s best you try to process the “what.” I’ll let you know when I have another liaison assignment for you.

4.

Archivist: So you obviously know how to stop it. You could just tell me!

Elias: I could. But I believe that if I did so, you would fail. The Stranger is antithetical to us.

[The Archivist sighs heavily]

5.

Gwen (defeated): I… Ok.

Gwen opens the door.

Lena: Oh, and Gwen?

Gwen: Yes?

Lena: Get some sleep. You look dreadful.

6.

Archivist: Of course, of course. Understood.

Elias: And for God’s sake, get some sleep.

End ID]

Thank you @princess-of-purple-prose for the ID!

[spicymancer]

What was the process like for designing the ActiRangers, their civilian and suited forms? Their suits look so cool, it’s definitely clear you have a lot of familiarity with the genre while also having great ideas on how to innovate and add your own unique elements! Did they go through lots of conceptual iterations, or did they come pretty naturally? Any particular teams that inspired you, like SPD or RPM with their numbered members?

So the Actirangers started out as characters designed for a private little Tokusatsu OC jam I did with some friends! The design I submitted was Pink, (hence why she's kinda the main character of the story)

(Real name and certain background elements redacted for spoiler reasons)

So Pink's suit was the first one designed, hence how she's kinda the most basic of the Rangers. I had just got done watching Birdie Wing and Love After World Domination and thought it would be kinda fun for a golf themed sentai hero.

She was originally going to be ActiRanger 5 before I thought of the "Four/Fore" golf pun.

The rest of the team was then designed from there with each of their sports in mind and some general vibes.

I don't think they went through all that much iteration, though I will say since I tend to draw them in Black and White I sometimes mix up which parts of their suits are their color and which parts are black.

I wanted to give them each some kind of Power Weapon so I stuck to stick sports and also Table Tennis. (I am still weirdly fond of the old Penny Arcade Paint the Line comics)

As far as Power Ranger teams that inspired them, Mighty Morphin' is obviously the biggest inspo. (The Dan Mora run on the Go Go Power Rangers comics is awesome.) Time Force, S.P.D. and RPM were all on my mind as well.

For the Gambit Gang I was struggling to come up with a fun villain theme and eventually figureod out that the enemy to the "Sports" team had to be the "Chess Club". (Insert joke about polycules and board games)

Gray in particular was conceived at this point when I and wanted an Evil Ranger on their side. Chess Knights having a vague horse theme, he obviously had to be Polo! His design draws pretty heavily from Mystic Force's Koragg which is still IMO one of the sickest designs Sentai has ever cooked.

Wow that got a little more long winded than I inteded but I hope y'all enjoyed this little peek behind the curtain of the ActiRanger's development!

Thank you all for enjoying my silly OC comics and doodles!

[catpriciousmarjara]

DP X DC: Dani Does Things and Leaves, Explains Nothing

Heavily inspired by this dp x dc prompt and the comments and reblogs under it:

Please go check it out and @stealingyourbones entire page. They have some great dp x dc content and meta.

Local Ghost Princess Decides to Help Out Fellow Clone, Leaves Chaos Behind, Heroes Left Concerned and Very Confused, More at 10.

Now Dani knew that this world had superheroes. She knew they had an organization of sorts that had a hate-hate relationship with various government entities and a love-hate relationship with the public, depending on who you asked. However she had no intention of being involved with them. She was on vacation after all. Besides this world was just a stopover anyway. Why bother when she wasn't here on official business? But it seemed that while she didn't want anything to do with the heroes, they, however inadvertently, wanted something to do with her. How else will you explain one of the worst cloning results she had ever seen crash into a tree right in front of her while she was enjoying a nice cup of litchi boba tea in the park?

The botched clone job slid down the branches and hit the ground with a thud. She raised an eyebrow at the the rampant malevolent magical lines running through the body exacerbating the overall instability of the clone's anatomy. Clearly this individual had run into an irate mage who cast some sort of destabilizing curse and shot them right out of the sky. Dani was thankful this was an isolated section of the park and that she had put a rudimentary avoidance ward over the area. Otherwise, a superhero crashing into a tree would've caused quite the ruckus and interrupted her boba time.

She took a sip of her boba and crouched down to examine the conked out hero. This one was the one they called Superboy wasn't he? She grimaced at the state of his engineering. Whoever did his cloning did not know what they were dealing with. Her own cloning went better and she was ectoplasmic goop half the time. And Vlad was dealing with halfa DNA! Probably the most complicated genetic material in existence. Superboy over here was constructed from actual tangible genetic sources and yet...ugh.

Honestly speaking beings of this plane probably wouldn't have noticed anything wrong. A level down in power scale compared to the individual who acted as genetic donor, most likely that Superman guy, and random instances of destabilization would most likely be the extend of their knowledge regarding their faulty cloning. And when those instances of instability gradually ironed themselves out they probably patted themselves on the back and thought all was well. She should cut them some slack.

Dani hummed as she chewed on her boba pearls. Unfortunately she wasn't known to be the most merciful when it came to ensuring the well-being of clones.

Suckers probably didn't pick up the fact they unleashed a possible catastrophe upon their world. Superboy was obviously fashioned from Kryptonian DNA. A species known for becoming near godlike upon absorbing solar energy from a yellow sun. That means that their bodies have mechanisms at play beyond simple biology. Specifically energy pathways and an energy processing core. Superboy wasn't a level down in power from Superman because of some biological imperfection, he was weaker because of flawed energy absorption and storage. And that meant that his energy core was unbalanced, and once it reached a particular threshold...well its gonna be a spectacular light show this side of the galaxy that's for sure. Of course it was just a possibility. There was no guarantee he would reach that threshold in his lifetime. Unless he ran into a white mage who was vicious enough to cast a juiced up imbalance curse that is. And what do you know! Turns out you can organically be that unlucky!

She put down her cup and ran a simple diagnostics. Sure enough the magic had intensified the issue. This man needed help, the kind of help that wasn't usually available in this part of the omniverse. But she just so happened to pass by and just so happened to have expertise in this field so today was somehow simultaneously Superboy's lucky and unlucky day. He really was going through it.

As to why she would interfere that's easy. She was the Guardian of Cloned Beings after all. She can't have a fellow clone suffer could she? And plus, what were the chances that he would end up like this right in front of one of the only beings that would know how to fix the issue? Dani grinned in glee. Truly the laws of causality worked in intriguing ways.

She stood up and let her talons manifest, plucking the strings of SuperboyConnerKon-el's make and striking them one by one in the tune of an old Krytonian melody. Shame what happened to them really, but all things had their fate. It truly was great to see some of them survive and make a home elsewhere. Dani wished them the best.

As she worked, untangling knots, and straightening out blockages, the hero finally began to stir. His eyes opened and they were understandably unfocused. Disoriented and confused, he looked kinda like a bamboozled Cujo and Dani felt her lips twitch up in a toothy smile. For some reason that seemed to startle him. She mentally frowned. Did he expect her not to smile at him? That would've been rude of her. Dani might be a gremlin but she was never impolite.

"I'm just about done with the curse", she told him. "Leaching out the corrosive magic was easy but I need to repair your energy coils and that's tricky. Don't worry though. Everything's on the house. Always did have a soft spot for the House of El ever since my aunt married into it for a short while."

Dani pulled a particularly stubborn power node open. "I would like your permission before doing that through. Body autonomy, informed decisions and and all! So yes or no? You'd detonate like a bomb if I didn't though."

The young hero's eyes widened. He still didn't seem to know what was going on so she hit him with a short term clarity spell. And a small information spell to cover her bases. That got him to gather his wits enough and she watched as he processed the influx of information. His complexion was ashen when he got through the bundle and he finally managed a shaky nod. Good enough.

Dani smiled at the Kryptonian. "Great! Now this would take like twenty minutes give or take five. You can sleep now." She promptly knocked him out cold and cancelled the spells so as to not overload his brain.

And just as she predicted, twenty minutes later, she plucked the last string with a flick of her wrist and surveyed her handiwork. Exemplary if she said so herself. One of her best work! Cheerfully she shot an awakening spell at Kon-el and crouched down again, patting his head.

"You might need to be careful for a few days while your body adjusts to its new energy capacity and conductivity. Your overall system has been optimized as well so be careful", she told the groggy young man.

She paused. "And don't worry. I didn't access your mind. This was all strictly physical repair aimed at preventing you from exploding like a supernova and taking the planet with you."

And once again that part made his eyes widen. Good. He truly understood the urgency. Or that could just be him being loopy after solar energy overload. It was a bright, sunny day after all.

She stood up, creating a portal to the next world on her itinerary. She looked back at the most likely high as a kite Kryptonian. "You kinda owe me for all that extra work hero! I might just come to collect one of these days!", she joked as the portal swallowed her body and she was lost to the spaces between spaces.

She'd already told him it was all on the house so Dani didn't think that anyone would take that last part seriously. However she forgot the fact that one Conner Kent was in her own words 'high as a kite' and hence might miss some crucial details.

She also forgot to leave behind an explanation packet.

And thus she was utterly unaware of the chaos she left in her wake, happily traveling through the multiverse.

..............................................................................................................................

"So you're telling me that not only did someone find me when I was out cold and get rid of the spell, but they also rearranged my guts and gave me an upgrade?"

"...Yeah."

"What the fuck?"

..............................................................................................................................

"Conner, do you remember anything? Anything at all? Whatever they did required some serious magical power. We don't know why they did it or how. For all we know they could've done something dangerous that we can't detect yet."

"Litchi boba tea".

"Kon what the hell?"

..............................................................................................................................

"...Its in bits and pieces...but I'm pretty sure there was a woman?...white hair, green eyes...something something on the house...something about an aunt and the House of El?...and there was this strange white symbol on her chest and this really soft music was playing that went something like this...(confused humming noises)...and something about me owing her?"

"Kara? Why are you looking at me like that? What's wrong?"

..............................................................................................................................

"Let me get this straight, Superboy was healed by the Kryptonian primordial goddess of portals, messengers, travelers and other such domains, and not only did she save him but also gave him a tune up? And explicitly said that he owes her now? And this powerful divine being, who is also supposed to be the daughter of Krypton's Death God according to legends mind you, is most likely still on earth with motives unknown? Plus your entire House is descended from her family?"

"...Yeah that about sums it up."

"..."

..............................................................................................................................

"Oh man why did this happen just when I was going to go on vacation? Why couldn't the Death God or whatever reschedule?"

"Death gods notoriously don't reschedule, they're death gods. Also she's the daughter of a death god, not one herself. Most death gods are also famously fair. If not fair by our standards, fair by theirs".

"...That's good to know?"

"I confess I don't know about the fairness of children of death gods however".

"...great. Thanks anyway J'onn".

"You're welcome".

..............................................................................................................................

"You okay there man? Someone just rifled through your body and did who knows what...that's gotta be terrifying. You want to talk? We're all here for you, you know that right?"

" Thanks guys. And yeah it was freaky. But apparently I would've exploded and blown up the planet with me if she didn't do that so I guess I'm more grateful than scared."

"...Explode and blown up the what now?"

..............................................................................................................................

"Is there anything more we should know about Clark?"

"Legends say she has a brother and he's associated with great calamities?"

"...."

"Bruce? You alright?"

..............................................................................................................................

DPXDC refuses to be done with me. Leave me be accursed crossover! Leave me be!

(Btw Kon didn't make the connection because he was really out of it, and not because Clark and Kara didn't introduce him to Kryptonian culture.)

Thoughts and suggestions are welcome!

[markrosewater]

The Nadu Situation

This has become a big topic in the community this week, so I wanted to add my thoughts to the discussion. My focus isn’t on the banning, but on the behind-the-scenes processes that led to it. I’m Head Designer, so I want to focus on the design elements of the situation.

When we make Magic there are a few things we do to try and make it the best it can be. First, we design in what we call an iterative loop. That is, we make something, we playtest it, we get feedback, we make changes on that feedback, and begin the next iteration of the loop. We try to get as many iterative loops in as we can before the set is locked (aka “no more changes”).

No matter where we set that line, there’s a last day to make changes. Moving that line earlier doesn’t change anything other than giving us less iterative loops to improve things. Also, we make lots and lots of last minute changes. The vast majority of them make the game better. I understand there’s more focus on the times we make a mistake, but it represents a truly small percentage of the changes.

Also, whenever we design a card, we ask ourselves, who is this card for? If we’re trying to make game play the best it can be, it helps to understand who will use the card, where they will use it, and what they will do with it. Obviously, in a game as modular as Magic, the players can often zig when we expect them to zag, but in general, this process leads to the best design.

We have two play design teams, one focused on competitive play and one focused on casual play. The competitive play design teams determines which cards they think have a shot at competitive play (remember we’re making predictions as where we think the environment might go,we don’t definitively know; we need to make an environment complex enough as to entertain tens of millions of players). The casual play design team then looks as the cards that don’t play a competitive role to see what casual role they can play.

With that said, let me respond to a few popular lines this week:

“Stop designing for Commander” - The nature of competitive formats is that only so many cards can be relevant. As you start making more competitive relevant cards, they displace the weakest of the existing relevant cards. That’s how a trading card game works. That means that not every card in a set (or even just the rares and mythic rares as the commons and uncommons have a big role making the limited environment work) has a competitive role. As such, we examine how they will play in more casual settings. There’s no reason not to do that. And when you think of casual settings, you are remiss if you don’t consider Commander. It’s the 800-pound gorilla of tabletop play (aka the most played, heavily dominant format). Us considering the casual ramifications of a card that we didn’t feel was competitively viable is not what broke the card. Us missing the interaction with a component of the game we consider broken and have stopped doing (0 cost activations), but still lives on in older formats is the cause.

“Stop making late changes” - Whenever you see an airplane on the news, something bad has happened. It crashed, or caught on fire, or had an emergency landing, or a door fell off. Why do we still make planes? Because planes are pretty useful and what’s being highlighted is the worst element. That focus can lead people to false assumptions. Magic would not be better if we stopped making last changes. A lot *more* broken things would get through (things we caught and changed), and many more cards just wouldn’t be playable. Our process of fixing things up to the last minute does lots and lots of good. Maybe it doesn’t get the focus of the screw ups, but it leads to better design.

“Everything needs to get playtested” - My, and my team’s, job is to take a blank piece of paper and make something that doesn’t exist exist. That’s not an easy thing to do. I believe play design’s job is even harder. They’re trying to make a balanced environment with thousands of moving pieces a year in the future. And if we’re able to solve it on our end, that means the playerbase will crack it in minute one of playing with it. One minute, by the way, is the time it takes the Magic playerbase to play with a set as much as we can. There are tens of millions of you and a handful of us. There simply isn’t time in the day to test everything, so the play design team tests what they think has the highest chance of mattering. They take calculated gambles (based on years of experience) and test the things most likely to cause problems. Will things slip through? There’s no way they can’t. The system is too complex to not miss things.That doesn’t mean we don’t continually improve our processes to lower the chances of mistakes, but nothing we’re going to do can completely eliminate them.

Designing Magic is difficult. Next year is my thirtieth year working on the game, and I think we have the most talented team we’ve ever had. Plus, just as we iterate on the designs in a set, we iterate on design processes of making Magic. How we make Magic today is light years different, and I believe better, than how we made Magic when I started. (”If I have seen further, it’s because I stand on the shoulder of giants.”)

One final thing. I’ve always pushed for transparency in Magic design. No one on the planet has written/spoken about it more than me. I truly believe Magic is better as a game because its players have the insight to understand what we, the people making it, are doing. We do ask for one thing in exchange. Please treat the designers who take the time to share with you the behind-the-scenes workings of Magic design with kindness. We are all human beings with feelings. There’s nothing wrong with feedback, but it can be delivered with common courtesy.

[hesperocyon-lesbian]

I posted this in the replies of a post recently but I feel like actually posting it so fuck it

This is all purely anecdotal, and I’d love for someone to do a study on this in some capacity but that’s probably not gonna happen so whatever. I’ve noticed pretty consistently that trans spaces I’ve been in lean heavily majority transmasc, particularly when they skew younger (eg college campus trans groups) and that on average transmascs seem to come out younger than transfems. To be extremely clear this is not a complaint, but rather an observation

And for a while now I’ve been pretty sure I know the reason for this. Generally, people who are afab have more leeway for gender expression when they’re teenagers than people who are amab do. This, obviously is not universal. There are many communities whose misogyny includes not letting those they perceive as women dress in pants or suits, etc. However, communities such as those are also just as harsh and violent to those they perceive as men wearing women’s clothes. Whereas, in communities where afab people dressing in pants, suits, etc is accepted, the same for amab people wearing dresses, skirts, makeup, etc is very rarely as accepted.

The end result is this: transfems rarely have our eggs cracked young, because what that often requires is an initial moment of gender euphoria. Dysphoria is far harder to recognize when it’s your baseline, and you’ve never experienced euphoria before. So, young transfem eggs rarely have the experience of trying on clothes that make them feel like the girls they are, whereas such moments seem more common for young transmasc eggs.

This, I think, is one of several reasons that the whole language and culture of “eggs” skews almost exclusively towards encompassing transfems. Our moments of exploring gender expression are rarer and later in life, and stand out so much because of the stigma and insecurity that surrounds them.

I think this is one of several disconnects that some tme people are having with the currently ongoing egg discourse. Transfem eggs often don’t have an opportunity to explore gender presentation ourselves, so we often require someone else to extend a hand and give us an opportunity to try on dresses or try out she/her pronouns or just make a part of us we’ve buried so deeply feel seen. It’s so much of a longer process to reach that point on our own.

To be clear again, none of this is to say that transmascs have it easy, or anything of the sort. Our transitions take different paths, and I think there will always be a disconnect if transfems’ paths to coming out aren’t viewed through the context of how limited our options are.

[murdrdocs]

this but from miguels perspective (gn!reader)

he thinks he's maintaining composure during the call. he manages to hold off the growl between his words, and his eyes are the usual amount of narrowed, so he thinks he's truly not being that obvious. but the envy sits heavily in his chest and the jealousy almost blinds him and of course, there's the devil on his shoulder to taunt him as soon as the call ends.

"were they just ...?" lyla's question doesn't need to be completed for miguel to know what she's asking.

"yea, lyla," annoyance is clear in his voice. to an outsider, maybe it's the usual annoyance that comes from miguel o'hara. but to the one who knows him best, it's a dose ten times bigger than usual.

"oh, someone's jealous." it's singsong, a direct taunt at his expense, something lyla's best at.

"i'm not jealous i'm upset that i now have to find another spider-person to fill in for spider-punk." lie. well, not completely a lie but mostly a lie.

lyla's tone says she obviously doesn't believe him. "uh-huh. sure." but then she's gone, and miguel's left to click on his watch and pull up the audio recording of hobie's call. all calls are recorded for ... archives and such, so it's not that weird.

miguel just needs to let out some frustration before he can focus again. he knows lyla will handle getting someone for the mission, he just needs 10 minutes on his own, with your moans lowly playing in the lab, and his fist wrapped around his cock.

he spits in his hand, the quarter of his suit between his navel and his knees disappears, and he plays the bit of audio that's clearest with your moans. when hobie deliberately paused to "think" about when he was next free, leaving miguel's ears to warm as his overactive imagination conjured up images of you, under the spider-person who upset him most.

his hand turns sloppy as he thinks about how hobie doesn't deserve you. he's too insufferable, too immature, and from the one accidental meeting miguel had with you, he could tell you were the opposite. you were sweet, pretty, the softest features and the most comforting eyes as you offered tea to the spiderman who'd jumped out of a portal and into your home.

miguel remembers scowling at the mix of items that were yours and hobie around the place, but his features leveled out when he saw you, wearing a long shirt that stopped mid thigh, a little bit of toothpaste crust at the corner of your mouth, and a bright smile as you tentatively approached hobie and miguel.

he felt disgusting in the moment, thinking about what you had under that shirt, if you even had anything under the shirt. you were young, clearly hobie's age, definitely too young for miguel, but so much nicer than most young adults, a simple fact that drew him to you even more.

he couldn't help but think about if you and hobie had just had sex while he accidentally stumbled over his words, having to take a pause all together as hobie shamelessly pulled your back to his front and rested his chin on your shoulder.

now, images of how embarrassed you'd looked then flashes into miguel's mind. is that what you looked like while your boyfriend fucked you on call to his boss? maybe your face was scrunched a little more with pleasure. maybe there were tears running down your cheeks, a show of humiliation and satisfaction.

fuck, miguel really wanted to make you cry. he wanted to see those pretty eyes well up with tears while he bounced you on his cock. not on hobie's. miguel wanted to wipe the salt water away, kiss them away, and continue to make you feel good.

he distantly realizes that he's groaning now, grunts thrown in there as his hips chase his own hand. it's messy, a little shameful, but the thoughts are coming into his head quicker than he can process.

pictures of you bouncing yourself on his cock, head thrown back. pictures of you begging to cum because you know that miguel controls when and if you do. pictures of you playing with yourself, putting on a show for him, moans high pitched and vulnerable like they are now as you beg for help.

and just as he's about to come, hobie speaks, and miguel sees a picture of the two of you, hobie being the one to get you off, eyes locked with miguel with that usual taunting look in them. but for once, it doesn't upset miguel. at least not when warm spurts of his own cum is spurting out of his dick and onto his previously clean skin.